NOWIN RACIAL JUSTICE

Romney’s New Ad Gets Obama’s Welfare and Food Stamps Policy All Wrong

The Romney campaign has released a TV ad titled “Can’t Afford Another Term,” that makes misleading claims about President Barack Obama’s welfare policy and slanders food stamps.

“If you want to know President Obama’s second term agenda, look at his first: gutting the work requirement for welfare, record unemployment, and more women in poverty than ever before,” says the male voiceover in the ad. “Doubled the number of able-bodied adults without children on food stamps. Record unemployment. More women in poverty than ever before,” the commercial goes on to claim.

Colorlines.com’s investigative reporter says the Romney campaign has made welfare and food stamp bashing a central part of it’s strategy to win the White House, convinced as ever that it can appeal to the GOP base by attacking programs for the poor.

Wessler emailed the following statement about the ad:

In the lastest ad, Romney resurrects the thoroughly discredited idea that Obama gutted welfare’s work requirements. (In fact, the waiver the administration offered to states would make it easier for welfare systems to move recipients into jobs.) The ad lumps welfare and food stamps together, again lambasting the President for large food stamp roles. The narration is careful not to slander all food stamp recipients, focusing instead on “able-bodied adults without children on food stamps.” The message is clear: Obama’s in the business of giving handouts to the underserving.

The Huffington Post reports the ad is running in markets that include Cincinnati, Dayton, Parkersburg, Wheeling and Zanesville, in Ohio. It’s also running in Colorado Springs and Grand Junction in Colorado; Gainesville, Jacksonville, Panama City and Tampa in Florida; Davenport, Omaha, Ottumwa and Sioux City in Iowa; Rochester, N.Y.; Las Vegas; and Charlottesville and Roanoke in Virginia.

Read this online at http://colorlines.com/archives/2012/10/romneys_new_ad_gets_obamas_welfare_and_food_stamps_policy_all_wrong.html

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